Dates
- Cover date
- February-March 1952
- Pages
- 36
Editions and covers
- Original editionSource ↗
Creators
Stories
- [The EC] Artist of the Issue · Graham Ingels · 1 pages
Biography of artist "Ghastly" Graham Ingels.
- A Stitch in Time! · The Vault of Horror! · 8 pages
An old-fashioned sweatshop, run by Mr. Lasch, makes the women work 14 hours a day, 6 days a week, for a salary of $6, using dangerous, outdated machinery, and being treated like slaves. Complainers were forced to go the "scrap box”: a place where scraps of cloth and thread were thrown together and they would have to untangle it all and respool the thread, a job that usually drove the woman insane. But they had a plan to get even, much to Mr. Lasch's regret!
- 99 44/100% Pure Horror! · The Crypt of Terror · 7 pages
Life had been good to Ernie ever since he had become manager of the Hudson Soap Company, and his predecessor, Benny Anderson, had disappeared. Benny had been his boss, really giving him a hard time in the soap plant, until one day he knifed Benny and threw his body in the rending vat, and made bars of soap out of him. The best thing is that no one could prove what had really happened to Benny. Then came the night that Ernie had a date with a showgirl and decided to take a shower, using one of those bars of soap. Benny ended up getting revenge on Ernie.
- Superstition! · 2 pages
Matison was just 200 yards from the sacred Zalunga temple during the secret rituals of the tribe, which meant certain death if he was discovered. When most of the tribe moved away from the area, he crept up on a lone guard, killed him and dragged him inside the temple, determined to photograph the proceedings. Hearing the Chief and the tribe returning, he spotted a platform with a coffin and decided to hide inside and film away. At the height of the ceremony, the Chief spotted him, Matison let out a scream, then realized that the casket he was in was going to be sacrificed to their gods.
- Dead Wait! · The Vault of Horror · 6 pages
In an isolated plantation home on a tropic isle, 'Red' Buckley's former plantation boss lies dead at his feet. In the shadows, a native, Kulu, watches Buckley get into the home's safe and remove a black pearl, then they enter a boat for a three day trip to Banggai. As Kulu paddles down the river, Buckley tells Kulu he will be paid off at Banggai.....then 'Red' discovers that they are heading for a village instead. When Buckley turns around to question the native, Kulu kills him with a machette....and proudly walks into the village with his prize: a human head with red hair!
- Staired... in Horror! · The Witch's Cauldron! · 7 pages
Irma stared down at the grave of her late husband and smiled....just as a gentleman came near to pay respects to his late wife. As the two conversed, Irma gleaned that this old boy must have money, so she struck up an on-going affair with this Mr. Hornsby, and plotted to have him murdered for his insurance.....just the way she murdered her first husband, Herman, for his! Soon, Robert popped the question and Irma accepted, and after their marriage, they went to his palatial country estate. But suddenly, as she looked up the carpeted winding staircase, the scene came back to her of the lighthouse steps she went up with Herman....and where she pushed him over the railing to his death! Soon the bickering started....Robert wanted to still visit his former wife's grave and Irma forbid it, eventually leading to his very ill health. Then one night, Robert bolted from his bed for the cemetery to visit his beloved Ethyl one more time, where he died from a fatal heart attack on her grave. Back at the estate, Iram was contemplating tearing out the spiral staircase when she looked up to see the the rotting corpses of Herman and Ethyl coming at her. She raced up the spiral steps to escape into the balcony bedroom when she remembered that she had had them sealed shut! In the morning, all that was found were the remains of two rotting corpses, and the body of Irma.....smashed into tiny little pieces!
Reprinted in
The EC Archives: The Vault of Horror (2021), The Vault of Horror (1982), The Vault of Horror (1990), Vault of Horror (1994), The Fantagraphics EC Artists' Library (2012)